


Other Worlds

by Esselle



Category: Sword Art Online (Anime & Manga)
Genre: (unless...?, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Everybody Lives, First Dates, First Kiss, First Time, Firsts, Future Fic, M/M, Non-Explicit Sex, Past Kirigaya Kazuto | Kirito/Yuuki Asuna | Asuna, Romantic Fluff, Warm and Fuzzy Feelings, are they still together? it's up to you because i couldn't decide)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-16
Updated: 2020-03-16
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:27:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23164717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Esselle/pseuds/Esselle
Summary: It's out of the blue; it's for no reason at all. It's a thousand brushes of their fingertips, it's a long journey to the capital city, it's shared beds and bruises and a bond Eugeo could never lose sight of, even when they tried to force his memories to dissolve into shattered fragments. It's all of this leading to a single moment. Abstract measurements colliding with warm lips, soft skin under his hands, dark fluttering lashes.Kirito is solid and sure against him, and Eugeo realizes:thisis real. It's more real than anything else he's ever felt, because Kirito is the first person to show him what that means.--Time, measured through each new experience.
Relationships: Eugeo/Kirigaya Kazuto | Kirito
Comments: 11
Kudos: 136
Collections: YujiKiriweek2020





	Other Worlds

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [YujiKiri fanweek](https://twitter.com/yujikirifanwee1) day 1: past / future / first time! 
> 
> help i am still very soft

Getting used to the fact that there are other worlds out there is overwhelming for Eugeo. From the things Kirito has told him, he now knows that Underworld is just one of many, countless others. And none of these are actually real, technically—only the world Kirito comes from is truly the real one. 

Although Kirito often likes to theorize at length about how maybe even _that's_ not real, there's no way to know, and they could all just be part of another, grander sim, and… Eugeo usually either feels his head is about to explode at that point, or one of the girls gets fed up and yells at Kirito to snap out of his existential angst, or Kirito himself realizes they've all stopped listening and cuts off with a sheepish grin.

The point is, there's hundreds of worlds out there, and Eugeo still hasn't been to any of them because of the difficulties in uploading his Fluctlight into another simulation. But they're working on it. They're getting close. And one day, all his friends have promised him, he and Alice will be able to come to the real world. 

It's a long ways off, and he doesn't really understand how anything can be _more real_ than the life he's living, now that he's free of Administrator's control. Now that he knows the truth. 

At least, that's what he thinks, up until the day Kirito kisses him for the first time. 

It's out of the blue; it's for no reason at all. It's a thousand brushes of their fingertips, it's a long journey to the capital city, it's shared beds and bruises and a bond Eugeo could never lose sight of, even when they tried to force his memories to dissolve into shattered fragments. It's all of this leading to a single moment. Abstract measurements colliding with warm lips, soft skin under his hands, dark fluttering lashes. 

Kirito is solid and sure against him, and Eugeo realizes: _this_ is real. It's more real than anything else he's ever felt, because Kirito is the first person to show him what that means. 

The way he feels about Kirito is overwhelming for him, too. But he wouldn't have it any other way. 

*

They're supposed to go on their first date that afternoon, flying out to an idyllic little spot in Alfheim, and Kirito is fairly sure he has never been this nervous before. Not even the first time he and Asuna went on a date. Probably. 

"Do you mean our first date, which you didn't actually _realize_ was a date," Asuna says dryly when he tells her he's freaking the hell out. "Or the second one where I had to front you quarters for the arcade because you totally suck at DDR?"

"I don't suck at—" Kirito starts to say, then shakes his head. "Anyway, I'm not talking about in real life! I mean the one where you wore the cute new outfit from that expensive store and we went to a cafe!"

Asuna squints at him. "Are you talking about the time we were trying to solve a _murder_ case?" 

He's saved from having to answer that one by Eugeo's blessed appearance. Kirito turns to look at the sky when he hears Eugeo call out, "Kirito!" 

Kirito means to say hi (in a very cool and charming way, of course) but the moment he sees Eugeo, his voice just gets completely stuck. Not only has he still not completely gotten over how _good_ Eugeo looks in ALO as a Cait Sith (those ears are, hmmm… a problem), but he's dressed different. Really… really _nice,_ and are those… _earrings?_

"What…" Kirito says weakly. Next to him, Asuna _fufufu-_ s very smugly. 

"Well, we know you have a weakness for _cute new outfits,"_ she says. "Sooo, I got Yuuki and Sinon to help me with a plan…"

Oh, the girl is good. Also, Kirito loves her very, very much.

"Asuna!" Eugeo waves enthusiastically as he nears them. "Kirito, I'm—woah— _look out!"_

He wobbles uncertainly in the air and tries to straighten out, but he's already thrown off his flight path. With a startled yelp, he shoots right at Kirito, clearly unable to stop in time.

"Got you!" Kirito says, holding his arms open for Eugeo to careen right into them. It's a good thing his stats are so high—the impact barely causes him to budge, but he's pretty sure it could have knocked a hole right through a solid wall otherwise.

"I'm so sorry!" Eugeo gasps, face brilliantly red. _And way too cute,_ Kirito thinks. 

"Couldn't wait for a hug, huh?" Kirito asks. 

Eugeo groans and drops his forehead to Kirito's shoulder. "I'm still not used to flying."

"Well, that's what today's about!" Kirito reassures him. 

Asuna sighs. "You're going to turn your first date into a practice exercise… why am I not surprised?"

Kirito rubs the back of his head. "Ah…"

"W-wait," Eugeo says. "Date? This is a date?! Is that why Yuuki and Sinon said I should wear these clothes? I thought it was the proper attire for flying! Why didn't you say anything?!"

"I just… didn't want you to feel, you know, nervous…"

Eugeo's ears twitch, which—again, really cute. But also, he is _not_ impressed. Kirito winces.

"Right," Asuna says, flitting up into the air, "you're on your own." She is gone before Kirito can say another word, leaving him to his fate. 

"Why would I be nervous?" Eugeo asks, and, okay, maybe Kirito was projecting.

"It's our first date!" Kirito tries to explain. "I mean, we've hung out a million times by now… you're my best friend! I didn't want to make it seem like things were changing, between us?"

Eugeo grabs the front of his shirt. "Kirito. If I didn't want things to change between us, I wouldn't let you kiss me all the time." 

Ah. _Oh…_ That's a pretty good point. 

Eugeo shakes his head, presumably at the dumbstruck look on Kirito's face, and leans in to kiss his cheek. "You're an idiot."

"I am," Kirito agrees. "We both knew that already, though."

"Yep," Eugeo says. "If you want to make it up to me… why don't you show me what you had planned for our _date?"_

Kirito grins at him. "I can do that."

*

There are some things Eugeo never thought he'd be able to experience. 

Love was one of them, high up there on the list. He wasn't close with his family. He'd lost Alice early on, and never thought he'd be free to find her. When he'd met Kirito again, he fell the same as he must have as a child—but he never thought they could be together, never imagined Kirito could love him back the way Eugeo loved him, not with all the things Underworld wouldn't let them have. 

But then the impossible suddenly _wasn't_ anymore. Apparently, when your best friend was used to breaking the rules of reality on a habitual basis, him falling in love with you was hardly the craziest thing that could happen. 

That didn't even touch the tip of the iceberg, because another thing Eugeo never thought he'd do would be to exist in the real world, in Kirito's world, with a human body to contain his Fluctlight mind, free to do whatever he wanted. It took them a long time to get to this point, years and years. The body—skin, muscles, nerves—is synthetic, but for all intents and purposes, it's real. When he touches something, when someone touches _him,_ it's literally no longer all in his head. 

And what really makes him certain he's as human as anyone else is how real and right it feels the first time he makes love to Kirito—to Kirigaya Kazuto, outside of a game, outside of a virtual reality and there in the real one. 

The apartment is new, their boxes are still unpacked, and it's the longest Eugeo has been conscious in the body they made him—that _Kirito_ made him, over tireless years and sleepless nights, fighting for government funding and blowing through the hard-earned money he made doing R&D for various VR devs when they weren't ready to trust a boy barely out of college with a project of such magnitude. He made them trust him in the end, with the same single-minded determination he did everything else. 

He's not a boy anymore, he's older, and that gleam in his eyes is more clever than ever, and he's handsome as _anything._ Still beautiful beyond belief to Eugeo's eyes when he gets bored of unpacking all too soon, tugging Eugeo towards that big bed in _their_ bedroom, all mischievous grins to hide his anxious excitement.

"Kirito, I'm not… I'm not used to this body yet…" Eugeo tries to remind him, but his protests feel weak. Kirito is having too easy a time pushing him down into the sheets, hands and mouth too effective at silencing Eugeo's worries. 

"Let me help you get used to it?" Kirito asks, far too innocent, and—there's no reason for Eugeo not to give in. 

It's clumsy, and awkward, and fumbling, both from inexperience with his body and his mind when it comes to sex. But his heart's sure, it knows what it wants, and that has always been…

"Kirito," he whispers, face wet with sweat and tears, but it doesn't seem to matter a damn to Kirito with the way he leans their foreheads together, clings to Eugeo, warm and alive and desperate for everything they can give each other.

"Told you," Kirito murmurs afterwards, curled up in his arms with a sheet half over them, one leg shoved between Eugeo's because he's needy and always has to be _everywhere._ "Told you it's way, way better when you don't have to…" He yawns contentedly. "…Stop to open your menu anytime you want to do literally anything…" 

"You were right," Eugeo says. "Although, you never forget where you put the lube when you can just pull up your inventory."

Kirito waves a languid hand. "I remembered fairly quickly."

Eugeo laughs, and kisses both his eyelids, and his scrunched nose. All of these things he never thought he'd experience, and even if this world is new and his body is unfamiliar, he wouldn't trade them for anything.

*

Ten years to the day they met ("met" being a very amorphous term for whatever happened to them), they find themselves back in the woods in Rulid. It's the place where the Gigas Cedar used to stand, the place where Kirito first wandered out of the forest and they laid eyes on each other for what seemed like the first time.

It wasn't; but after the pain of unraveling their history, they've made lots of new firsts to make up for the ones that were taken from them. Still, it's here in these woods that everything started—it's where they shared their first meal together, where Kirito first taught Eugeo how to handle a sword, and where they became the first to chop down the tree. 

And ten years later, it's the place where Eugeo becomes the first to propose.

Somehow, Kirito thinks maybe he should have been expecting it—the day, the place, the way Eugeo fidgets over every little thing the entire week leading up to it, the way he's been practically glowing whenever they're near each other. That's just kind of how he is all the time, though, both the fidgeting and the glowing. And maybe Kirito is just too smitten to even notice anything beyond how damn good it feels to let that glow light him up, too. 

When Eugeo asks him if they can go visit, he says yes without thinking. 

When Eugeo laces their fingers together and looks at him with eyes greener than the forest around them, and asks him if Kirito would stay with him forever, in all of those countless worlds they have yet to explore, he says yes to that without thinking, too. He doesn't have to think. 

He _does_ cry, but that's normal, and Eugeo laughs even though he's also crying, both of them trying to wipe each other's tears. 

"Hey," Eugeo says, voice as soft as his smile, "what happened to 'stay cool'?" 

"You're too cool for me, Eugeo," Kirito half-jokes, half-hiccups, before he pulls him in to kiss him. "How am I supposed to stay cool when you're this amazing?"

A little over a year later, Kirigaya Kazuto says his first "I do." 

He realizes, staring down as he slips a shiny black ring onto Eugeo's finger, the inky twin to the ice blue one he wears on his own hand, the one thing they've never really had a first for is saying "I love you." 

But he kind of likes it that way. He looks up at Eugeo, and sees it right there in his smile. 

He's not sure it can be counted as a first when it's something they've always known.

**Author's Note:**

> I AM REALLY HAPPY TO HAVE A REASON TO WRITE ABOUT THESE TWO AGAIN
> 
> I have [more YujiKiri stories here](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Esselle/pseuds/Esselle/works?fandom_id=28118457), or if you're wondering which of my stories to read next, you can **[check out my guide to my fics on Carrd!](https://esselle.carrd.co/)**
> 
> I'm on Twitter at [@Esselle_hq](https://twitter.com/Esselle_hq) (sometimes nsfw)! SAO twitter [@ Esselle_SAO](https://twitter.com/Esselle_SAO)! I also have a [curious cat](https://curiouscat.me/Esselle_hq)!


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